President-elect Donald Trump has said a lot of things that trigger all sorts of whys and hows, and he has done it again during a recent interview. According to Trump, he told Apple CEO Tim Cook of his intentions to get Apple to build its products in the US.
The president also told the press that ex-Microsoft CEO Bill Gates called him, as well. Trump didn't exactly detail what the conversation with Gates was all about, although he was quite keen on relaying his alleged talk with Cook.
Donald Trump Wants Apple to Halt Operations Overseas
"Tim, you know one of the things that will be a real achievement for me is when I get Apple to build a big plant in the United States..." said Donald Trump of his phone call with Cook. "Instead of going to China, and going to Vietnam, and going to the places that you go to, you're making your product right here," he then added.
Not to fall short on the shock factor Donald Trump himself caused, he claimed Cook showed understanding. This is when he asserts the incentives for Cook and Apple overall, saying that he'd mandate a cut on tax for corporations.
Donald Trump, Yet Again, Is Courting Controversy
Apple hasn't responded yet to a presumably mountain of requests for comments. A confirmation of the phone call with Donald Trump is still hanging in midair, though this would bring us all back to what the late Steve Jobs reportedly said to President Obama in 2011.
In a report by The New York Times, Jobs reportedly told Obama that the US' manufacturing jobs won't be coming back. Given that these jobs have been disappearing by the millions for more than ten years in the US, the potential to get Apple build its products in its homeland has long been dismissed, at least according to Jobs. However, what if Donald Trump did carry out his plan of a very large tax cut for corporations?
On Apple's horizon, it's not just China's cheap labor it's after. Apple is reliant on the convenience of having various components of its supply chain in one place, reports Forbes. What Donald Trump presumably doesn't realize, is that recreating that in the US is neither easy nor cheap.
Whether the phone call between Tim Cook and Donald Trump actually happened or not, Apple building its products in the US is undeniably a long shot. For now, we'll see how things go for Donald Trump. A full transcript of Cook and Trump's alleged phone conversation is available at The New York Times.
